SOAK

Well, its Friday =) I hope everyone has had a great week. Fridays are my "off" days, and the day I take for myself just to do whatever, so more than likely I will do video and blog posting then.
   A few months ago, I had the privilege of getting to facilitate at my churches ladies Bible study,and is was such a wonderful experience.Im sharing this with you, because it was at one of these sessions where God just put something in my heart and just today I was reminded of it, so I wanted to share,

Proverbs 23:17-18 says:
                     "Don't for a minute envy careless rebels;
                       Soak yourselves in the fear of God
                       Thats where your future lies
                       Then you won't be left with an armload of nothing".

The word that stood out to me in this passage is the word soak. Soak. To make or allow something to become throughly wet by immersing it in liquid. It can also mean to impose heavy taxation on. Ive been on a particular diet for well over a year now. On this plan I eat a ton of beans. I typically just use them straight out of the can, but on this particular day I decided to cook them myself. The instructions said to soak them overnight.I thought this was really silly. Wanting them to come out just right, and being the researcher that I am, I was curious as to what the soaking process actually does, so I looked it up. When you soak beans, you remove some of the indigestible sugars that cause gas.SOAKING MAKES THE THINGS AROUND US EASIER TO DIGEST. NOT ONLY THE THINGS AROUND US, BUT GODS WORD AS WELL. Beans are dirty. When beans soak, the scum rises to the top so it can be wiped away. The scum is the anti nutrients, and all of the things that aren't good for us. I hope you can see where I am going with this. Yesterday I made a batch of beans,pinto beans. I don't know if you have ever noticed,but pinto beans are very unique looking. They have these unusual spots and stripes on them. After soaking them for hours, I made the observation that they didn't even look the same. For one, they were fuller and plumper, not a speckle or a single stripe on them. It was almost as if they had completely transformed.THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE SOAK IN THE PRESENCE OF GOD. This transformation process takes time, all good things do. If you take shortcuts, you won't get the full flavor and richness that was intended.
   Soaking makes things easier to digest,and makes things that would normally be uncomfortable more bearable. It also gets rid of all of the "bad things" that are unbeneficial.It removes the dirt and the scum, and after the process is all over with, we don't even look the same. We act different. We think different. We become more like the individuals that God created us to be.
  Have you felt lately like you have been left with an armload of nothing? Ill admit, at the time of this revelation, I felt like that. It is in that moment that you have to ask yourself, have I spent time soaking lately? Am I dry? Most likely the answer probably is yes.


"Soak me in your laundry and I’ll come out clean,
    scrub me and I’ll have a snow-white life."
Psalms 51:7(The Message)